Welcome back to Lending Leadership: The Creative Brief.

In our latest episode, we’re diving into a topic our audience asks about all the time: event planning. We know great events don’t just happen—they’re meticulously crafted and strategically funded, often supported by thoughtful sponsorships. To help us unpack the “what, why, and how” of event planning, we welcomed a very special guest: Melanie Schuyler, HMA's event director, who has become a true pro at turning ideas into successful, unforgettable gatherings.

Melanie has worn many hats—social media, graphic design, and event planning—but it’s her passion and expertise for organizing events that have made her such a powerful force behind some of the most effective industry meetups on our calendar. In this candid conversation, she shares lessons learned from trial and error, the power of preparation, and why a solid checklist can be your event’s best friend.

Key takeaways:

1. Preparation is Everything: The success of any event hinges on meticulous planning. Even details as simple as extra copies of seating charts or prepared name tags can make all the difference. And remember, mistakes are simply opportunities to improve your next event!
2. Delegate and Assign Clear Roles: Don’t try to go it alone. Bring in extra hands, assign tasks before the event, and allow others to help. This frees you up to focus on being the connector and leader during the event itself.
3. Build Relationships with Sponsors: Sponsorships don’t have to feel awkward. Start with partners you already know, offer them genuine value (visibility, face time, swag tables), and see your events become more affordable and impactful for everyone.
4. Make the Attendee Experience Seamless: Consider every part of the attendee’s journey—from finding the venue, to the room flow, to making newcomers feel welcome with clear signage and purposeful table arrangements. Creating a friendly, anxiety-free environment pays off in engagement.
5. Always Be Promoting the Next Event: Use your current captive audience to your advantage! Put up easy-to-scan QR codes, distribute event cards on tables, and get feedback through simple surveys. This helps you fill the next room and lets the audience shape future topics and formats.

Whether you’re a new loan officer planning your first happy hour or a seasoned pro looking to scale up your annual rally, Melanie’s advice and our group’s discussion is packed with actionable, real-world tips. And remember—just start. No event is perfect the first time, but every event is a step toward excellence.

Have questions or want help planning your event? Drop us a DM or comment. We’re here to help you turn ideas into experiences that build lasting business relationships.

Don’t forget to subscribe to Lending Leadership for more creative strategies and expert guests. We’ll catch you next time!

Rach & Rinn

So it's really important to know what kind of help you're going to need and really plan who can help with what. And having that prepared and giving people those little assignments in advance is going to help you tremendously once you get on site. The venue.

From intimate happy hours to full blown sales rallies, great events do not just happen. They're crafted, they're strategic and often funded by very smart sponsorship opportunities. In this episode, we are super exc excited to sit down with Melanie Schuller, our very own HMA events director, to unpack the what, why in the how behind event planning and getting others to help you with it. Melanie, welcome. Hi.

Thanks so much for having me.

So excited you're here with us today.

Mel. We're, we're excited to dive into events. I think events are something we hear a lot from loan officers that everybody wants to do events, but sometimes they don't know where to start. We do hear that people get a little bit worried about how much is it going to cost. So we're going to dive into sponsorships, the who, the what, the how of how to create a great event. And who better than the events director herself and guru? Mel, you know, we've all been to great events, but what do you think makes the difference between a great event and an awkward event? Because I think I've into both sides of that.

That's a great question. I think right off the bat I have to go with preparation. People don't realize how important preparation is when it comes to planning events. People think, you know, you can just snap your fingers and the event is going to plan itself, but that's definitely not the case. And that's not to scare you. You know, we want to, you know, kind of talk through the resources today of what you can do and little tips and tricks that you can take to actually plan events really well.

That's awesome. I mean, you've come a long way, Mel. We've been doing this for few years now. Can you tell me a little bit about some of your early experience and some of the biggest things you've learned as you've gotten further into your career and done more and more types of events?

Yeah, absolutely. I'll just give a little bit of background on when I started with hma. So when I started we had a really small team team and I was planning events, but I was also doing, you know, social media, I was doing graphic design and, you know, a lot of other little projects here and there. And as we continue to grow, I kind of found My passion in events and, you know, right out of college, I wasn't really sure what I wanted to do. I knew I had a passion in kind of all three areas, but it was really cool to kind of be able to build upon that and get experience in all three areas. Social media, graphic design, and events. And it just so happened that I really enjoyed the event space. And here we kind of are today.

It's almost been, I think, four years, if I'm not mistaken, in September. So it's. It's been an awesome ride. But a lot of things, you know, I've learned throughout event planning is really just from the experience. And I think you know a lot of things you can start and you think that you know everything. You know all of the details that you need to hit, but a lot of times you'll just continue to actually learn, and you learn from making mistakes. I think that's one of the huge things that I've learned in my career so far, and Corinne will probably attest to that as well. But you don't know until, you know, these little things happen.

And that's really. I think one of the big pieces, Pieces of event planning tip that I can give is that you have to make the mistakes to find out what is going to work for you and how you can continue making each event that you plan even more amazing.

Yeah, I would agree with that. I think that's a really strong point. We're on the same lines there, Mel. Yeah, Because I'm thinking the same thing. When I came out of college just a couple of years ago, I actually started off in events. I worked for a large event planner at a nonprofit in Pittsburgh. Mel. And just exactly mirroring what you were saying, I can't reiterate it and enforce it more that you really find out those details, you figure out those steps, you figure out the extra layer you missed or that additional detail that just makes the experience for the realtors or the customers, whomever, your audience is just a little bit stronger.

And that is all figured out through a mistake. Forgetting something, not pivoting or stepping the right way. And then guess what never happens? The next event that never happens. It doesn't happen again because you dialed it into your process.

Exactly.

Well. And you know what, too, ladies? Isn't it interesting that when you're the one running the event, oh, my gosh. You feel like if there is a mistake, everybody knows about it. Everybody saw that. But most times people don't.

Not the case.

People don't notice. So to give yourself Grace if you do make a mistake. But yeah, to learn from it and prepare differently the next time because you're right, you don't know what you don't know until. Until you know it and then you never forget it. That's right. Mel, do you have like a event toolkit that you bring with you at every event that there's just a whole bunch of stuff in there?

I. I kind of do, actually. I have one box that I bring specifically for our lunch and learns they have a little bit more logistics and a little bit more planning that goes into them versus like a smaller happy hour. And they have things like a room layout that's really important when you're hosting big events. Things just like a seating chart. So for our loan officers, we will give them tables that have their names on each table so their realtor partners know where to sit with them. So preparing those things in advance, having those things with me, having extra copies of those things because you never know when you're going to spill coffee on one or someone else at the event is going to say, hey, can I take a look at that? So you always want to be prepared with those extra copies of things. Sign in sheets.

I'll have in there extra pens, extra Sharpies, name tags. All the things go in my little toolkit box when I bring to events.

That's awesome. Mel, let's dive in a little bit about. I mean, you covered a couple of topics. You know, what are some things you think about when it comes to room layout, when it comes to, you know, let's touch upon if the event might be a more formal event, deciding whether or not you want to have assigned seating or you want to make it next style. What are some of the things you think about when making these decisions to make sure that it's a stronger experience again for the attendees?

Yeah, for sure. So one thing, like first and foremost you want to think about when you're picking out your actual venue is really just thinking from the attendee experience, what that's going to look like for them. And you really want to think about how is the actual event space going to flow? Because sometimes we find that we have these really great venues that we love, but getting there through the venue to the actual event space, it might be a little challenging or someone that's not familiar might not know how, which way to go. So we like to be prepared with little arrowed signs that will actually direct them to the actual space that we're hosting the event. So that's super helpful for the Actual flow. Flow making sure that you know, you're staffing your event with somebody right at the front who can actually direct verbally or if anyone has any initial questions. And then when it comes to the actual event space, that can really depend on what kind of event you're hosting. For example, a happy hour, if you want something very casual, more so reception, like you might just have some high tops where people can just stand around with a drink and mix and mingle.

And in that sort of situation, you wouldn't want to really have assigned seating because people just want to go in, they want to go with the flow, be casual, have, have a good time. And you know, for a more formal event like a brunch and learn or a lunch and learn, you might want to think more about how can I make sure that the loan officers are actually getting as much out of the event as we can get for them. So that's why we like to do that assigned seating. So when their realtor partners come in, they see their loan officer's name and they know exactly where to sit and they know that their loan officer is going to sit with them. So they're going to be able to get that face to face time with their loan officer while enjoying a presentation. That's a very relevant topic to the industry.

I think that's huge. Especially when people go to an event, they don't know anybody. They're people have a lot of anxiety around that, you know, I'm gonna walk in and where am I gonna sit and who am I gonna talk to. So to make it as open and friendly as possible, that's a really great tip. And what a simple thing to do. That's I, I like that. Yeah, someone flying solo.

Exactly.

Now for some of these larger events where, you know, maybe you're looking at, you know, when I say larger, maybe it's mid size for some, depending on what, what you typically do. But say 80 plus people, 80 to 200 plus people. Tell us a little bit about the importance of the relationship of the contacts. The manager on site. Tell us a little bit about your background process on that and how instrumental that is in pulling off a really fabulous event.

Yeah, I mean you really want to make sure that when you are planning event you have that one person that's going to be the lead contact from start to finish. It's really important, you know, specifically for vendors who they're actually communicating with. You know, for example, a larger event where you have a little bit of a bigger budget, you might, might want to Hire a professional photographer, a videographer. And that vetting process takes time. And you might want to get on the phone, you know, with a couple of vendors, make sure they're a good fit for you. And having that one contact that the vendors that you end up hiring, they know you, they're used to talking with you, they're comfortable with you, and you're comfortable with them. And it's also really important, you know, on site, the event as well, for you to be the main contact, because people are going to come in, they're going to have questions and you're going to be the one that you know. Ultimately you think you know all the answers.

You might not. Once in a while people will come to you with a question, you're like, oh, I got to think about that. But again, that's that learning experience experience that, you know, you might not think that you're going to get asked something, but you do. And then next time that that happens, you're prepared for it. So yeah, it's, it is very crucial to have a one person who kind of dials it all in. It's definitely helpful to have one or two other people that kind of know what's going on, extra sets of hands that can help you logistically during setup, during the management of the actual event. But I would say leading up to it, you have to have that one person who can really take the time that is needed and dial in all those details.

And I guess that goes back to the preparation too, you know, taking the time to prepare.

Yep.

Funny enough, even though we say this, we do have a lot of people that I get this, I get an idea in my head and I just, I want to run, I want to do it right then. I don't want to wait, I don't want to wait two months. I want to do it next week. But there really is a, a time to breathe and a time to plan when you take some time. So, so what does the, the perfect number look like? Is there okay, if someone comes to you with an idea, is there a magic number that you're like, okay, let's plan this five months from now, six months from now. Like what does that look like?

I would say for our larger events, so like six sales rally, for example, for those aren't familiar, we have a two day event. There's lots of speakers and panels and moving parts and vendors and signage and swag. There's so much that goes into it. So for something like that, I honestly in a sense compare it to a wedding so in very large events like that, where you're having so many moving parts, I would say sometimes up to a year in advance, which to some that might seem like a lot, but a lot of these vendors and these venues are getting booked up. I don't think a lot of people will realize that. But especially if there's one venue that you're like, I gotta have it. I love that place. You really have to prepare in advance.

When it comes to, you know, smaller lunch and learns and smaller happy hours, you can really still plan a great event. I would say about two to two and a half months out is going to be like that sweet spot where you're still going to have some places that have those, you know, weekday availability, which honestly might work better for a lot of loan officers and realtors. So you might be able to snag that place that you really like. But yeah, it kind of just depends on what event you're trying to plan and kind of how many logistics goes into it.

Yeah, I like that a lot. I would also say and recommend to loan officers any extra set of hands or resources that you have available to you the day of the event, definitely go ahead and bring those individuals. So maybe it's an LOA or a shared loan partner that you have, or maybe it's somebody in your marketing department that's able to allocate some resources out, bring anybody additional that you can. Because I know it can feel a little intimidating, especially if you have a larger number of people coming to make sure that the logistics are going right. But then you're also trying to be a connector, be a local connector and a salesperson and a customer service person as well. Right. So you want to be able to work the room as a loan officer, but you want to make sure that all those details of food, drink, logistics, you know, anything special themed or oriented you have going is also being handled so that the, the whole day and the moment runs very smoothly. Um, yeah.

Yeah. To add to that now or rage.

Yeah, I do actually. And I think, Mel, you do this really well. So to. To just piggyback on everything you just said, Corinne, to.

To.

To be able to delegate. I see so many people when they get to an event, they want to help. What can I do? What can I do? And if you're the kind of person who thinks you're going to do it all by yourself, it's not going to happen. And I've seen you do this really well, Mel, where you, you give people jobs because they do want to help but if you're not sure what direction to go, you know, then they're just off doing something else.

Yeah.

Or maybe doing something that you really don't want them to do. Doing it their own way.

No, no.

Yeah. It's important to prepare as best you can. And again, it's going to be a learning experience. You might think, oh, like you said, Rach, I can do this all. And then next time you're going to say, I should actually bring some help. So it's really important to know what kind of help you're going to need and really plan who can help with what. And having that prepared and giving people those little assignments in advance is going to help you tremendously once you get on site, the venue.

Yeah, that's great advice.

Well, I want to shift gears a second on the topic, but moving into another category, sponsorships. Can you tell us a little bit about how you handle sponsorships? I know these, these types of moments can get expensive. And for a loan officer that's just trying to get, you know, some type of consistency in the market down, or maybe they find that venue and they're like, how many times a year can I do this? And versus expense. How do you handle sponsorships? And. And how does that work, Mel?

Yeah, definitely. So for sponsorships, when you're really new to it, it can be a little bit intimidating because, you know, you're just going and you're saying, hey, can money towards my event. But it's really thinking about how can you benefit these companies and partners that you're working with and how can you give them that face to face time, that brand exposure, you know, things that they kind of don't know that would really help them and you'll show them that it will. And you want to really start off if you're kind of like, I have nowhere, I have no idea where to start starting off with the people that you know, your connections already is going to be 100% the place that you want to start those partnerships that you might already have built. So, for example, in our Pittsburgh market, our president, Dave, he has some really good friends and partners of a title company, of a moving company, insurance company, and he has been able to create these partnerships and he just started by reaching out to them and saying, hey, would you want to do an event together sometime? You know, we could both invite our realtor partners and, you know, it would be a really fun time. So just starting, like, even with a really casual conversation like that, honestly with the people that you do know and the People that you do have that relationship with, that's going to be really where you want to start. And you know, you can offer them, like I said, that face to face time. So if you're doing a lunch and learn, you know, five, ten minutes before you actually start that presentation, you can tell the sponsor, hey, why don't you go up on stage and do a three to five minute intro.

You know, tell the guests about who you are, what you can offer them. You know, simple as putting their logo on the invitation. That's something, you know, very, very easy that you can offer your sponsors. And one of my favorite things that we offer our sponsors is a swag table. So you know, we just ask the venue, we say, hey, could you supply us with a couple of six to eight foot tables? And nine times out of ten they have those tables and they'll just give them to you. And you can have your sponsors come, bring some signage, bring some sweet swag to give out to the attendees. And I find that the sponsors really love to do that and the attendees really love that too. Especially when you have a couple of sponsors.

It almost feels like a mini expo where you're having all guests go table to table and they get to meet all the sponsors. And then you know, after a while you'll, you'll notice that you'll build up those sponsor relationships and you know, you can year after year for those annual events go back and say, hey, you good for this date? And they'll be like, yeah, let's do it. So it will become like a really fun and easy way, you know, to keep that connection and relationship with your partners for sure.

That's so important to mention, Mal, that those are great points and I think sometimes any, anytime we're asking someone for money for something, it's like, oh, what am I doing? And it feels a little awkward, but it really does make a difference in everyone's business. You are getting that face to face time which is so valuable and it is beneficial to all parties, especially picking the right, the right partners to do this with. And it really does take the financial burden off of just one person. I would think that's probably one of the biggest, the biggest reasons people are not doing events. They think it's going to be too much money and they don't want to have that burden on them. So if you're one of those people listening, talk to the people you work with all the time, talk to the people that are in your circle. It doesn't have to be as, as, as Big of a financial burden, as you might think.

One other thing I would add to that, we were talking about, you know, local business partners, like appraisal groups, title groups, folks that you're working with, moving companies, but also look inside your organization. I think sometimes in some different cultures and scenarios, you know, loan officers might be shy to partner up with another loan officer in or near their market and do an event. I totally disagree with that. There's. There's a lot of benefit in showcasing yourself as a team doing an event together. Everybody knows that. You know, you might work with one realtor, another person's working with a different realtor, invite those groups, have a combined thought session together where you bring an expert topic or speaker in, and it's going to make you guys look stronger. It's going to stand behind your company brand, and you'll find that there's still a ton of business to go around for everybody.

And those relationships will continue to solidify as. As they were before the event. So don't be shy and don't shy away from, you know, talking with another fellow loan officer that you enjoy working with and seeing how you might be able to work together to. To offset some expenses and to make an event even stronger with a larger audience. We do it all the time, right? We do it all the time.

It.

And we've seen it.

It works.

I mean, it works.

I. I know from my own experience when you go into event and it. And it just feels like there's not many people there, like you feel kind of bad for the host. But I like walking into there. There are more people in it, number one, you get more questions. The realtors love it because everybody loves to mingle and to have those conversations and network. So, yeah, don't be afraid of that. I mean, we've had some really people that we wouldn't have thought would partner together either.

And it really works. It's great.

Really does.

You know, Mel, let's talk about at the event, finding a speaker or putting together. You had mentioned panels. We do panels for our sales. Ral, when you're putting an event together and looking. Let's start with a panelist first, because that's. That's easy to do internally. What kind of things are you looking for when you're putting together the dynamics of a panel or the personalities in a panel or even just the topic and themes?

Yeah, that's a great question. So when you're looking to, you know, find a good panel you want to start off with, what is your topic? What do you know the attendees at your event want to hear? So starting off with that and kind of understanding that yourself first, I think is step one. Because that way you can be really clear when you're, you know, going to these people that you may know, similar to sponsors, you're going to want to look for people in your network, people that you already know that could possibly be a good fit. Um, and I think, you know, just having that casual conversation, reaching out, saying, hey, you know, I really want to talk about this topic at my next event. You know, you have a lot of experience. Would you be open to it? Um, and you know, I think finding that one person first is a really great start. And you can even ask them, you can say, hey, do you know anyone that would even be a great fit to work? You guys could work together on the panel and then it kind of just expands from there. And logistically, I think, you know, panels can sometimes sound a little bit like, I don't want to say scary, but logistic wise people are sometimes like, how do I execute that without, you know, adding more cost, adding a lot of more logistics.

And so what we have done and what's really worked well is similar to the sponsors where you're saying, hey venue, can you just give me an eight foot table? You ask for another table and you put it in the front of the room, you put a nice tablecloth on it with three chairs and you have a perfect panel ready to go. It can be that simple.

Yeah, I like that. I like that a lot, Mel. And I think it is a lot more simplistic than we think.

Yes.

You know, don't overthink the process. Just execute by putting people in front of a room. Having a conversation is interesting to industry peers 100%. One other thing I want to touch upon that I think is an important piece that has to keep being developed and can sometimes be missed is using the audience you have in the room to start gaining traction on your next event. It could be a simple, a simple moment that's missed where you forget to throw the QR code up to register for the next event, or you forget to have the speaker make a little two minute plug on the next event coming up. Also, in addition to that, you could provide a very simple surve on how did you like this topic, what other topics would you like to hear? And this way you're not constantly coming up with the ideas, but you're allowing the audience to kind of spoon feed you what the next topic speaker idea would be. That would be Valuable to them. And then you're kind of ensuring, or in a warmer space to ensure that you get those individuals back into a room, plus hopefully more.

Right. Mal, you've done this process. Why don't you tell us a little.

Bit more about it? Yeah, yeah, absolutely. So, again, it's one of those things that you do not need to overthink it. You might think, oh, you know, this is another detail I gotta handle. But really, it's so simple. You know, once you kind of get in the groove of planning events and doing things annually, you'll, you know, you'll go to an event and you'll already have your next event planned and ready to go. So that's when you need to take that opportunity to be advertising the next event at your current event. So something so simple that we do is we make a little graphic. We will print it out on cardstock and fold it in half like a little.

Just a little tent card. And it's so simple, it's very affordable. You know, if you're having multiple events within, you know, let's say three weeks, and, you know, your next event, your next big event isn't for another month, two months, you can reuse those cards. So it's really simple like that, and just making sure that you're putting them really where everyone is coming in. So thinking about that flow, you can put them at the registration table, you can put them at the swag tables, you can put them at where they're sitting to eat. And then another thing, layer that we like to add is actually putting the scan QR code for them to register for that next event up on the presentation screens. So when people are coming in, that's what they're seeing on the screen. They're like, whoa, another event I can just register right now.

So it's kind of top of mind, right when they're coming into the venue.

I like that you just said that. Top of mind, that is the whole, the whole name of the game, right? Staying top of mind and staying relevant. And what better way to capture them when they are in the room? They're right there. So get them. Get them while it's hot.

Yes.

It's like popcorn.

Yes.

No, I, I think we've seen that from, you know, actually implementing it, inviting people to an event after the fact, but then also having the invitation up like you said on the QR code. And I think, I mean, the, the proof is in the pudding.

It's.

It's amazing how many people you'll get right away.

Yep.

Yeah, that's great. Mel, any. Any last tips or tricks that you would want to give to loan officers? Maybe someone who is really on the fence, maybe they haven't done an event in a long time or maybe they just have never done an event.

Yeah.

What's one piece of advice that you could offer?

Yeah, definitely. So, one thing that actually a couple things. First and foremost, I would say find a really, really affordable like Event Planning 101. I think that that straight off the bat would be really easy for someone to do. You can find trainings online for, you know, around $15. So that's like really, really affordable. You could just take, you know, a couple of weeks, go through it. And I would say, you know, in addition to that, starting off with making yourself a.

A checklist. This is something that I've done and kind of developed over the years that I've been doing events here. Starting off with a checklist for yourself, going through that checklist whenever you're planning your event, after the event, you know, debrief, think. Think about what went well, what didn't go so well, and look at that checklist and alter it for your next event. And eventually you'll see that that checklist will grow. But in a really good, you'll notice that you're going to start to find those little tiny details that at first you might have missed, but then as you continue to plan events and get more experience, it's going to be second nature to you. But you have to start somewhere. And I think just a simple checklist like that can be really effective when you're starting out.

That's great. Do you want to bring us home, Rachel?

Sure.

I mean, I love that. I think that is the simplest advice is always the best advice. And just get started. Nothing's going to be perfect the first time around, but just get started and I think you will be pleasantly surprised. If you have any questions about events or anything that we can help with, be sure to drop us a DM or a comment. We'd love to help you. Just get going. And Mel, thank you so much.

This is great for anyone in any industry, but obviously we're talking to our realtors and loan officers, so thank you.

Of course. Thanks for having me.

It's awesome. She's our rock star. Our event.

That's right. Don't forget to like and subscribe. Lenting leadership, everyone. We'll catch you next time.

Bye.

See ya.

Bye.